e lest she should get out of the
manor than that the tenants should get in.

"She can't be far off," he thought, pausing doubtfully in the hall.

For the moment he almost forgot the anti-renters and determined to
find her at all hazard. He hastily traversed the upper hall, but was
rewarded with no sight of her. He gazed down the stairs eagerly, with
no better result; the front door was still closed, as he had left it.
Evidently she had fled toward the rear of the house and made good her
escape from one of the back or side entrances.

"Yes; she's gone," he repeated. "What a fool I was to have trusted her
to herself for a moment!"

A new misgiving arose, and he started. What if she had succeeded in
leaving the manor? He knew and distrusted Little Thunder and his
cohorts. What respect would they have for her? For all he had done, it
was, nevertheless, intolerable to think she might be in possible
danger--from others save himself! A wave of compunction swept over
him. After all, he loved her, and, loving her, could not bear to think
of any calamity befalling her. He hated her for tricking him; feared
for her, for the pass to which he had brought her; cared for her
beyond the point his liking had reached for any other woman. A
mirthless laugh escaped him as he stood at the stairway looking down
the empty hall.

"Surely I've gone daft over the stroller!" he thought, as his own
position recurred to him in all its seriousness. "Well, what's done is
done! Let them come!" His eyes gleamed.

With no definite purpose of searching further, he nevertheless walked
mechanically down the corridor toward the other side of the manor and
suddenly, to his surprise and satisfaction, discerned Constance in a
blind passage, where she had inadvertently fled.

At the end of this narrow hall a window looked almost directly out
upon the circular, brick dove-cote, now an indistinct outline, and on
both sides were doors, one of which she was vainly endeavoring to open
when he approached. Immediately she desisted in her efforts; flushed
and panting, she stood in the dim light of the passage. Quiet,
unbroken save for the cooing in the cote, had succeeded the first
noisy demonstration; the anti-renters were evidently arranging their
forces to prevent the land baron's escape or planning an assault on
the manor.

In his momentary satisfaction at finding her, Mauville overlooked the
near prospect of a more lengthy, if not final, separation, and